June 23, 2010

Over at Searching for Style, there is a great read about the process behind the making of an Hermes scarf, ultimately becoming a discussion about what luxury is and an explanation for the pricing behind an item that may at first seem extravagant.

These are the kinds of behind-the-scenes glimpses into the business of fashion that I'm always interested in, and the sort of thing I tried to go into (albeit more briefly) when I wrote posts over at my old work that were also called Fashion 101.

June 13, 2010

Sometimes, I feel that I need to work on learning more about the history of fashion design (it's been a few years since we did that primer course) and also become one of those people who can recognize an item from the Chanel 1986 Spring Summer collection just like that.

Some very interesting claims so far (I'm just a third of the way through the book):

1. In practice, we understand prices really in terms of the product's "relativity" to it's previous price (or what we think it should be priced at), and the prices of competitors rather than what a certain dollar amount is "worth" or "means." Which certainly explains why we feel like a discounted $500 pair of shoes can be a "bargain" even though we may not have paid $300 for the same pair at retail "on principle."

2. After a certain point price stops being an objective marker of value to the buyer - for example, a $1000 watch would not bring you 100 times more happiness (or tell time that much better) than a $10 watch, but regardless you might want to buy the much more expensive timepiece...

I'm just now trying to figure out what these findings mean for my personal shopping habits...

June 3, 2010

One of the best parts of freelancing has got to be actually getting out of the office and meeting some of the names that I have seen so often on call sheets, but never actually worked with in real life. There is something great about watching someone with amazing amount of experience work, and learning something small in the way that they interact and carry themselves, even if I'm not at the point where I'm actually collaborating with them.

I had the chance to assist on a shoot with Hans Feurer behind the lens this week, and it was great fun to try speaking in my terrible French with a fashion legend.

Hans loves the morning light, which really shows in many of my favorite photographs that he's taken.